Liv Ullman Returns to Norwegian Cinema for 'In a Mirror, in a Riddle'

Now that Ingmar Bergman has left us, and doesn't appear to have won any chess games since, it is time for Liv Ullman to return to the cinema of Norway, her native country. Ullman grew up there and made her film debut there, but it was in Sweden that she broke out internationally when she appeared in her first Bergman picture, Persona, in 1966. After that she worked on a couple more Norwegian films, but she primarily stuck to working with non-Norwegian filmmakers, including Bergman, who cast her as the lead in nine films, two of which earned her Oscar nominations. Now it has been 38 years since the actress starred as the title character in Arne Skouen's An-Magritt, her last Norwegian film (I guess Unni Straume's Dromspel doesn't count). Why the long absence? Ullman, who currently calls New York her home, claims she actually hadn't been offered anything in Norway in all that time. But now, according to Reuters, she's finally returning, having been cast in a film titled In a Mirror, in a Riddle, which will be directed by Danish filmmaker Jesper Nielsen (Okay).

In the film, Ullman will play the grandmother of a seriously ill 13-year-old girl. It's a role the actress claims brought her out of retirement (her last appearance was in Bergman's final film, Saraband), having cried happy tears while reading the script. She told the daily Dagbladet she's very proud to be a part of the film. In a Mirror, in a Riddle is based on a novel by Jostein Gaarder, best known in America for his bestseller Sophie's World, which has previously been filmed as a Norway-Sweden co-production, and which is also currently being made into an English-language movie starring Michael Caine.